The Conference Board’s US Employment Trends Index edged up in January to a reading of 130.04 from December’s upwardly revised reading of 129.73. The January reading, which followed a slight decrease in December, is up 2.4% from the same month a year ago.

“The continued growth in the Employment Trends Index suggests that job growth will remain solid and perhaps even accelerate in early 2017,” said Gad Levanon, chief economist, North America, at The Conference Board. “In both business confidence surveys and hard data, it appears that businesses are becoming more optimistic and are more willing to expand their workforce.”

Positive contributions from six of the eight components fueled January’s increase. The percentage of respondents who say they find “jobs hard to get,” was the largest positive contributor, followed by initial claims for unemployment insurance and the percentage of firms with positions not able to fill right now, respectively.

The US Department of Labor on Friday reported the US added 227,000 jobs in January and gained 14,800 temp jobs.